Prosecutor General asks for ex-congressman’s acquital in ‘parapolitics’ scandal

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Colombia’s Prosecutor General requested the country’s Supreme Court Monday to acquit a former congressman who is accused of ties to paramilitary groups.

The Prosecutor General’s delegate to the court, Jorge Alberto Gonzalez, noted there was no witness or documentary evidence proving Mario Solomon Nader’s alleged political pact with the former commander of the AUCFreddy Rendon Herrera, alias “El Aleman.”

“I simply ask that you [the court] do justice…There is no proof that exists to say with knowledge or belief that [Nader] had an accord to promote the paramilitaries.”

Nader is alleged to have conspired with the AUC to ensure his election to congress in 2002. The lawyer called the accusations “fictitious.”

Nader has been implicated by several AUC members who claimed the former lawmaker held meetings with top paramilitaries such as the AUC’s former commander Salvatore Mancuso.

According to Alberto, these testimonies are unreliable and contradictory.

Dozens of Colombian politicians have been convicted for for their ties to the now-demobilized AUC. The massive infiltration of the drug-trafficking organization into the coalition of former President Alvaro Uribe has popularly become known as “parapolitics.”